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The welfare queen myth is one of my favorite conservative ghost stories too! I love how it simultaneously suggests that poor people are poor because they want to be poor, hints that the key to solving their problem is to shove them deeper in to poverty, and leaves just a slight aftertaste of racism in your mouth. Really though, bringing up disproven conservative talking points from the 70's isn't a good way to be taken seriously. No one with a brain in their head believes that welfare fraud makes any meaningful impact on the nations economy any more because it never did. The entire concept was just an attempt to scapegoat poor people for economic problems thought up in a conservative think tank in the 60's as a way to focus economic anger downward toward the underclass, instead of upward towards the wealthy, the direction in which such anger had traditionally been focused since the dawn of time.

FYI; In Thrice Upon A Time, http://www.amazon.com/Thrice-Upon-Time-James-Hogan/dp/0671319485, a scientist discovers the ability to sent particles back through time, affording the ability to send messages. At the same time, a giant fusion reactor starts to create mini-blackholes, and he needs to use this ability to send information back to correct things before disaster strikes. Published in 1980, it appears to predict and foreshadow much of the LHC issues, fears and discussions.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thrice_Upon_a_Time for more info.

Bill DeSmedt wrote about the possibility of sending message to the past in his book Singularity. An interesting take where the messages sent to the past directly lead to the future from where the messages could be sent. It kind of implies that neither the past nor future can be changed but cause and effect are not bound by time.

I think your comment is spot on, and sexual privacy in face of societal pressures is one of the greatest issues when considering privacy. I remember some time ago couple who got divorced in Germany because a speeding ticket camera caught the guy with his woman lover in the passeger seat. The guy later sued the city for violating his privacy. Our two faced attitude towards sex must be confronted/discussed at length as society evolves. Progress is being made (with homossexuals being able to go out in public and all) but this is an evolution that will likely take many generations.

Yet for all that agreement, I'd like to point what I think is a misconception in you post:

I am not saying that opposing man's own nature is a bad thing entirely -- there is a place for asserting limitations or else we would all kill one another and there would be no progress at all.

The idea that violence and disregard for other people's life is natural, and that education and police is what prevents us from destroying each other is actually false. I recommend taking a look at the work of primatologist Frans de Waal, in particular his book "Good Natured: The Origins of Right and Wrong in Humans and Other Animals" link Essentially we are hard wired to feel empathy, and empathy compells us to do good to others (those of us who are not psychopaths, of course).

Every time I read a universal biometric plan, I think of the old sci-fi book, This Perfect Day by Ira Levin. It was written in that timeless-far-future style that Asimov or Clarke would write, and it describes a day when all people had a nameber (a name/number combined) like "Bob RM04TG5002," all but a few old-timers were genetically indistinguishable by sight, and all governance was centralized into an all-knowing UniComp. Everyone had to ask UniComp for everything by touching their permanent bracelet to a scanner at every opportunity. Of course the main character was quirky and rebelled.

As a kid reading it, it really taught me the concept of willful non-conformism and individuality. Other stories like Caves of Steel touched on parts of it, but this was the central idea here. Worth a quick read if you want to grab it. Don't thank me, thank Uni.

Yes, I know how shady Amazon is. I can't imagine how much risk might be involved in having something shipped from one of their warehouses.

Seriously that was like the second result for "region free dvd" on Google shopping. You must not be looking very hard.

Fair enough. I am currently reading Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States" and it is eye opening in how long the US elites have been playing the divide an conquer games to stay in control.

Unfortunately the racially charged atmosphere in the US makes it easy to misread your originally comment as racially tinged - even if there was no such intend on your part.

Hey, at least you have an idea now why it probably was modded down originally (Disclaimer: I didn't mod it down, but given how I misread it I may have had I moderated that day).
 

Learning can (and usually does) happen outside of formal schooling.

Again, the library can be a good example. Can we make better libraries where people can go when they have an issue (like child raising issues) and get lots of support in all sorts of ways?

The internet provides some of that, but not in a face-to-face or hands-on way generally. So, we still need local spaces to learn and practice in, and things like "workshops", too. Part of this learning is life-long, but the fragmentation of US families due to jobs and geographical moves makes good parenting harder to learn from relatives. And there is so much disinformation out there, and so much profit-oriented misinformation (Baby Einstein?) that it can be hard to sort through it all...

We can create all sorts of better parenting resources (and homeschooling/unschooling resources), but there are plenty already out there.
http://www.google.com/search?q=emotion+coaching
http://www.google.com/search?q=unschooling
http://www.fci.org/new-site/parents.html

From the last, from "Mr." Fred Rogers: "Parents don't come full bloom at the birth of the first baby. In fact parenting is about growing. It's about our own growing as much as it is about our children's growing and that kind of growing happens little by little."

There is a video on that page of Mr. Rogers talking about parenthood to parents, and growing into that identity as a major life task, and requiring the help of many. It takes a village to raise a child? Maybe it takes a village to raise a parent? So, I think you are on the right theme to think about how to help parents -- it is just that the "school" model as far as compulsory school may be the wrong model for that (even as I have no objection to groups that meet regularly for convenience for people to learn together perhaps guided by someone more experienced in some way, but generally where learning is going both ways).

I had been surprised to see Fred Rogers had written books about parenting, having seen him as a kid and thinking he just made stuff for kids. But, when you think about it, the two things, kids and parents, go together. (As does then later, a living neighborhood and growing people.)

And different things work best for different personalities and histories, so I don't want to push just one agenda or style even as I feel there are some habits that are generally better in most situations than others (and even if I may struggle with them myself):
http://www.motherstyles.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parenting_styles

The biggest issue is that parents don't have much time to learn from all the resources out there with the combination of the two-income trap and falling prey to various supernormal stimuli (like mainstream media or junk food). Such stimuli in the context of a stressful society leads to addictive seeming behavior (like watching TV instead of interacting with kids or learning more about parenting). Related:
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2004/11/two-income-trap
http://www.amazon.com/Supernormal-Stimuli-Overran-Evolutionary-Purpose/dp/039306848X
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park

I should have added that, like schools vs. TV, organized religion also has some strengths in relation to helping people try to resist addictions and pressures of a materialistic world such as with twelve step programs (again though, that does not mean o

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=golden+sun&x=0&y=0

The Cuckoo's Egg is a great book on hacker hunting.
http://www.amazon.com/Cuckoos-Egg-Tracking-Computer-Espionage/dp/1416507787/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1300160625&sr=1-1

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Norris
"William Charles Norris (July 14, 1911 near Red Cloud, Nebraska -- August 21, 2006) was the pioneering CEO of Control Data Corporation, at one time one of the most powerful and respected computer companies in the world. He is famous for taking on IBM in a head-on fight and winning, as well as being a social activist who used Control Data's expansion in the late 1960s to bring jobs and training to inner-cities and disadvantaged communities. ...
    Another CDC project that Norris championed was the PLATO system, an online teaching and instruction system developed at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The university developed most of the system on a CDC-1604 machine driving graphics terminals of their own design. In 1974 they reached an agreement with CDC to allow CDC to sell PLATO in exchange for free machines on which to run it. PLATO was released in 1975, but saw almost no use due to its high costs and complex maintenance. In the end PLATO did see some use as an employee training tool in large companies, but was never a success in the original education market."

I corresponded with him for a time around 1991. He sent me a copy of his biography (by James C. Worthy):
http://www.amazon.com/William-C-Norris-Portrait-Maverick/dp/0887300871

He also sent me copies of his essays for CDC publications. I wanted to make them available in OC'd digital form but never quite got approval for that. Here are several of them put up by others though:
http://www.cbi.umn.edu/hostedpublications/NorrisOnTechnology/index.html

A relevant one from there (on education):
http://www.cbi.umn.edu/hostedpublications/NorrisOnTechnology/Norris_2-Education.pdf
"Another problem is pricing. The present method of financing most formal education with tax dollars, contributions, and tuition at lower than cost inhibits improvements in quality, productivity, and availability. It also restricts options that could otherwise be available and maintains the inequality in educational opportunity that results from uneven district-to-district financial resources."

Although I go beyond that here: :-)
http://www.pdfernhout.net/towards-a-post-scarcity-new-york-state-of-mind.html
http://patapata.sourceforge.net/WhyEducationalTechnologyHasFailedSchools.html

I met my wife around then so things dropped off, but I had hoped maybe I could have been an intern for free with his foundation to help with advanced manufacturing (or something) or somehow worked with him and learned from him.

William C. Norris was an amazing person. He really is a great role model in many ways, and I'm glad I had the chance to read his biography and correspond with him. I sent him a small donation back then (just a struggling grad student at the time) and he said he used it to take a disadvantaged person to lunch. What a guy! :-)
    http://reddwarf.wikia.com/wiki/Ace_Rimmer

Isn't the fact that it's "good, free, and open" the exact reasons the publishers wouldn't use it? It kinda flies in the face of them being tyrannical mongrels controlling the media distribution if customers can actually meaningfully use it.

From the publisher's point of view, MP3 is as free and open as FLAC is. That's why a lot of them do sell FLAC. Like the Beatles (before they were even in the Apple store), the Rolling Stones and even Metallica.

Giving the benefit of "is this a serious question":

The Complete Book of Scriptwriting by J. MIchael Straczynski (the Babylon 5 guy). The book is almost entirely about the business of being a writer in Hollywood, what you can expect, how you can avoid being screwed, where you can't avoid being screwed (so suck it up), what the Screenwriter's Guild is and is not good for, how to get an agent, etc. Now, this might not be exactly what you're looking for in that you're talking about completed work (which will be its own issue... was your show made with union/guild stagehands? Actors? Electricians? Musicians? If not, some studios or distributors won't touch it because of union retaliation), but the chapters on how to pitch a show will be directly relevant.

Cable-only networks are much easier to directly pitch to than majors like ABC, Universal, Warner, Discovery, etc. These tend to be very niche, which means small dedicated audiences. You have a much better chance of getting contact with the programming director of Logo than HBO. And you might be able to avoid a fistfight with Russel Crowe or getting puked on by David Hasselhoff, too.

Good luck.

Wait, did you connect your computer to the network using a regular cable when you did the conversion? There's your problem. You need to use a good network cable or the bits aren't polished properly when you convert from MP3 to FLAC. You might think "but I didn't even use the network when I was converting". Doesn't matter--the audio bits leak out of there if you're not using the right cable.

Also, check out a very interesting book, Sex at Dawn, by Christopher Ryan and Cacilda Jethá.

Yes, you would be amazed how human biology points to sperm competition.

And our closest primate relatives are not chimps. We are far more like bonobos. Read the book.

It doesn't matter. Smartphones already outsells PCs. On the African continent, there will be 800M smartphone only users by 2015. They wont be running Windows.

It's not fake! The creature from Jekyll Island says it's just fine.

Bicycling Science for those of you with a more theoretical taste for cycling.

First off, human males *do* have a mechanism to sweep out sperm from other males, consisting of the most visually obvious part of the male penis and protracted mechanical movement. We lost spikes, we evolved something else to do the same function. Secondly, there are many other mammals that have different methods for accomplishing the same thing: male squirrels have something like superglue that forms a plug after coitus, to prevent other males gaining access afterwards. (And female squirrels have claws and quite a bit of expertise in removing those same plugs, as you'd expect in any good arms race.) Likewise, many male lizards and insects avoid the problem by just staying connected until the female is ready to lay her eggs, which puts a whole lot of stress on the female during that period: they both get eaten pretty often.

But if you really want to get weird, go look at insects like bedbugs, where males practice traumatic insemination: they don't go looking for an orifice, they make one, and let the female's body figure out what to do with the results. Or bees, where the barbs aren't there to stimulate ovulation but to make sure the penis breaks off and acts as a plug that can't be removed.

And the next step weirder is hermaphrodites, where mating is a contest in which both wish to inseminate the other without getting inseminated, so mating strategies get seriously complicated. (The phrase 'penis fencing' has been used.)

Anyone who is curious about this should read the brilliant book Promiscuity: the evolutionary history of sperm competition by Tim Birkhead. It will make you relieved to be human.

Joe Konrath has an interesting interview with independent writer John Locke who currently holds the coveted #1 spot in the Amazon Top 100 and has sold just over 350,000 downloads on Kindle of his 99 cent books since January 1st of this year which with a royalty rate of 35%, is an annual income well over $500k. Locke says that 99 cents is the magic number and adds that when he lowered the price of his book "The List" from $2.99 to 99 cents, he started selling 20 times as many copies - about 800 a day, turning his loss lead into his biggest earner. "These days the buying public looks at a $9.95 eBook and pauses. It's not an automatic sale," says Locke. "And the reason it's not is because the buyer knows when an eBook is priced ten times higher than it has to be. And so the buyer pauses. And it is in this pause - this golden, sweet-scented pause - that we independent authors gain the advantage, because we offer incredible value." Kevin Kelly predicts that within 5 years all digital books will cost 99 cents. "I don't think publishers are ready for how low book prices will go," writes Kelly. "It seems insane, dangerous, life threatening, but inevitable."

The story should have read:

Joe Konrath has an interesting interview with independent writer John Locke who currently holds the coveted #1 spot in the Amazon Top 100 and has sold just over 350,000 downloads on Kindle of his 99 cent books since January 1st of this year which with a royalty rate of 35%, is an annual income well over $500k. Konrath says that 99 cents is the magic number and adds that when he lowered the price of his book "The List" from $2.99 to 99 cents, he started selling 20 times as many copies - about 800 a day, turning his loss lead into his biggest earner. "These days the buying public looks at a $9.95 eBook and pauses. It's not an automatic sale," says Locke. "And the reason it's not is because the buyer knows when an eBook is priced ten times higher than it has to be. And so the buyer pauses. And it is in this pause - this golden, sweet-scented pause - that we independent authors gain the advantage, because we offer incredible value." Kevin Kelly predicts that within 5 years all digital books will cost 99 cents. "I don't think publishers are ready for how low book prices will go," writes Kelly. "It seems insane, dangerous, life threatening, but inevitable."

In spite of the error, this particular submission is very thought provoking as evidenced by the number of comments it received and is one of my personal favorites. Please accept my apology for my mistake in attributing the statement about "The List" to John Locke, the subject of the interview, when the statement was actually written by Joe Konrath, the man who conducted the interview. I assure you that the mistake was completely inadvertent on my part.

Best Regards,

Hugh Pickens

Joe Konrath has an interesting interview with independent writer John Locke who currently holds the coveted #1 spot in the Amazon Top 100 and has sold just over 350,000 downloads on Kindle of his 99 cent books since January 1st of this year which with a royalty rate of 35%, is an annual income well over $500k. Locke says that 99 cents is the magic number and adds that when he lowered the price of his book "The List" from $2.99 to 99 cents, he started selling 20 times as many copies - about 800 a day, turning his loss lead into his biggest earner. "These days the buying public looks at a $9.95 eBook and pauses. It's not an automatic sale," says Locke. "And the reason it's not is because the buyer knows when an eBook is priced ten times higher than it has to be. And so the buyer pauses. And it is in this pause - this golden, sweet-scented pause - that we independent authors gain the advantage, because we offer incredible value." Kevin Kelly predicts that within 5 years all digital books will cost 99 cents. "I don't think publishers are ready for how low book prices will go," writes Kelly. "It seems insane, dangerous, life threatening, but inevitable."

The story should have read:

Joe Konrath has an interesting interview with independent writer John Locke who currently holds the coveted #1 spot in the Amazon Top 100 and has sold just over 350,000 downloads on Kindle of his 99 cent books since January 1st of this year which with a royalty rate of 35%, is an annual income well over $500k. Konrath says that 99 cents is the magic number and adds that when he lowered the price of his book "The List" from $2.99 to 99 cents, he started selling 20 times as many copies - about 800 a day, turning his loss lead into his biggest earner. "These days the buying public looks at a $9.95 eBook and pauses. It's not an automatic sale," says Locke. "And the reason it's not is because the buyer knows when an eBook is priced ten times higher than it has to be. And so the buyer pauses. And it is in this pause - this golden, sweet-scented pause - that we independent authors gain the advantage, because we offer incredible value." Kevin Kelly predicts that within 5 years all digital books will cost 99 cents. "I don't think publishers are ready for how low book prices will go," writes Kelly. "It seems insane, dangerous, life threatening, but inevitable."

In spite of the error, this particular submission is very thought provoking as evidenced by the number of comments it received and is one of my personal favorites. Please accept my apology for my mistake in attributing the statement about "The List" to John Locke, the subject of the interview, when the statement was actually written by Joe Konrath, the man who conducted the interview. I assure you that the mistake was completely inadvertent on my part.

Best Regards,

Hugh Pickens

Those are becoming less and less of an issue.
WARNING - I have recently purchased a kindle and have become a huge Kindle Fan boy.
From http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=200127470

Can I loan a Kindle book?
Eligible Kindle books can be loaned once for a period of 14 days. The borrower does not need to own a Kindle -- Kindle books can also be read using our free Kindle reading applications for PC, Mac, iPad, iPhone, BlackBerry, and Android devices. Not all books are lendable -- it is up to the publisher or rights holder to determine which titles are eligible for lending.

Learn more: Lending Kindle Books

Can I share content with other Kindles?
You can enjoy your Kindle content on Kindle devices or Kindle applications that are registered to your Amazon.com account. There may be limits on the number of devices (usually six) that can simultaneously use a single book. Subscriptions to newspapers or periodicals cannot be shared on multiple devices. You can see all your Kindle content and send downloads to your registered Kindles or Kindle applications from the "Your Orders" section of the Manage Your Kindle page.

If you like stories, then the kindle seem to be the best read out there. Far better then the iPad or Nook.

The iPad does so many other things and is such a different device I wouldn't even compare them except for the fact that Apple sells that as a feature.

I bought a bunch of PKD short stories. 99 cents for 10 I think. Dated but interesting reads. No wan in hell I would ahve paid more then 99 cents for them.

Funny you should mention Ferran Adria. He seems to like the book, as does David Chang:

Ferran Adrià of El Bulli has said, “This book will change the way we understand the kitchen.” David Chang, the chef and owner of Momofuku, called “Modernist Cuisine” “the cookbook to end all cookbooks.” As Mr. Chang explained, “Only someone like Nathan could do something this comprehensive and rigorous, and we will probably never see another cookbook like it again.”

Blumenthal likes it too (and Wylie Dusfresne, too):

"A fascinating overview of the techniques of modern gastronomy." --Heston Blumenthal

Myhrvold has always acknowledged the contributions of people like Blumenthal, Dufresne, and Adria to modernist cuisine and to the techniques he describes in his book. That's probably why he co-authored the book with one of Blumenthal's protoges.

The paperback version of that same hardcover that I paid $2 for is on Amazon for $10.85.

A downloadable version is certainly not worth $9.95. A buck? Sure. But that's about it. Times have changed.

I'd imagine his name might have had a small amount of impact on his popularity.

Yeah.. he certainly has a nice sounding name. I'm sure i've heard of that author, and I haven't even been browsing Amazon...

Specifically i'm sure i've heard of this of his eBooks before.

Unlike baseball, basketball and football aren't statistics games. Baseball has statistics for everything and can be number crunched. That's why we live in what's considered the 'Moneyball Era'. Specifically, what can be crunched in baseball that isn't or can't be crunched in other sports is defense and that typically because baseball is on of the very few sports in which the defense has control of the ball.

In football, how do you rate a DB (a defensive back)? There are some defensive statistics, like tackles and interceptions, but there are intangibles that aren't tracked in a statistics line. Marcus Trufant, a DB for the Seattle Seahawks, doesn't have gaudy defensive numbers because he's so good that the offense doesn't even tend to throw the ball to his side of the field. How do you put that into a statistic that can be digested by a computer? It's not that easy.

Basketball is the same way, other than blocks and steals it is very difficult to get a defensive picture of a player. Since it's not just a one-on-one game, you can't quantify points scored against a player. Without some metric to be able to get a defensive picture of a team, which isn't uniform throughout a game, it's very difficult for a computer to figure out what to do.

We can't even get a simulation even close enough to determine who the best teams in college football are at any given moment. Why? Not enough statistics in a game that doesn't lend itself to statistics. Basketball has this same issue but is solved by having a big tournament for both the collegiate and professional ranks at the end of the season.

I agree with the observation that reinforcing behaviors are deliberate. My wife and I discussed exactly how to handle these issues on an ongoing basis. It was also my habit to spend a lot of time with both daughters, walking around and observing things, pointing out, explaining, and reading every street sign or anything else that presented an opportunity. Language is incredibly important. Beyond this is the part where I disagree -- "short sentences" are *not* obvious. I actually have clear memories of learning to speak and read, and I *hated* it when people spoke down to me. So I did not do that with my daughters. No baby talk. Use complete sentences. Use the correct word, even if it is not common vocabulary, etc. Of course, if my kids had not been capable of learning from this I am sure I would have reverted to tradition, but that did not happen. Both began speaking very early, and learned rapidly.

I don't recall specifics around 18 months, but I do know that my older daughter was reading well before she turned 3, because we read together every night and I would write the date that she first read a book on her own inside the front cover. I remember the exact book that convinced me that this wasn't just a good memory: http://www.amazon.com/dp/0679832696/?tag=googhydr-20&hvadid=3878470371&ref=pd_sl_17n0twlwjr_e#reader_0679832696 (P.J. FunnyBunny Camps Out). She read that out loud to me about 3 months before her third birthday, without any help from me, and without anyone having read it to her first. After a year of preschool at age 3, we were convinced that a second year of it would be a waste of time, especially when she would recognize misspellings on paperwork the administrator was sending home to parents. We found a private kindergarten that would take her if she passed an interview and made it through a class (this while she was still 3, in order to register for the fall classes that would start a few weeks before she turned 4). During her class time, she took to walking around the class to help the other kids with their work, including writing names for those kids that did not know how to write their own yet. I remember the kindergarten teacher being shocked that she had correctly spelled "Christopher" for one of those kids.

Daughter two has always been a little more difficult to assess. I can't tell you when she learned to read. Before she was 3, she confirmed with me that she had read the phrases on two signs in a parking lot correctly, after we took her to get glasses to correct for her "lazy eye". This was in the parking lot of the optometrist, when I was putting her into the car seat while her mother was still inside paying the bill. I believe she was just validating that her glasses were working properly. After that, she refused to perform -- would not even read the same signs to her mother. I would read to her every night just like I had with her sister, but she refused to ever read for me. I was convinced that she understood how to do it, she just did not want to. When she went to preschool, we would hear gushing reports from her teachers about how well she read, but never got any demonstration of it at home. Likewise it went, on up through the other grades. She is in second grade now, and I am still reading to her every night and she still refuses to read out loud for me, except when it is a homework assignment. My wife helps out with the school, doing math and reading assessments, and daughter two is in the "advanced readers" group. My wife says she is so far ahead of the other "advanced readers" that it is like night and day. She does read voraciously on her own now, having just completed several of the Harry Potter novels. I had recently read a few of the "Illustrated Classics" versions of some of Jack London's books to her, including White Fang and Call of the Wild. Tonight she told me she doesn't like the simplified

There's also an "X For Dummies" book too : http://www.amazon.com/Your-Babys-First-Year-Dummies/dp/0764584200

You must be talking about subjunctive replay.

Is it cheap? The iPad is a 9.7" touchscreen with 16gb for $400. I can buy a 10.1" 1.6ghz Atom netbook with 1gb RAM and 250gb hard drive for $250. And no, Best Buy isn't running a crazy special, Amazon has two different models of netbooks for ~$250 brand new.

True, the iPad has a touchscreen and those cost a bit, but the netbook has a lot more parts and the cost of a Windows 7 license.

I'm trying to figure out why we're not being flooded by $200 iPad clones.

Is it cheap? The iPad is a 9.7" touchscreen with 16gb for $400. I can buy a 10.1" 1.6ghz Atom netbook with 1gb RAM and 250gb hard drive for $250. And no, Best Buy isn't running a crazy special, Amazon has two different models of netbooks for ~$250 brand new.

True, the iPad has a touchscreen and those cost a bit, but the netbook has a lot more parts and the cost of a Windows 7 license.

I'm trying to figure out why we're not being flooded by $200 iPad clones.

The iPod Touch isn't an MP3 player, or PMP. It's a PDA, which of course includes music and video apps. Only two of the devices you called out are PMPs, none of them are PDAs, and the iPod Touch certainly has a much better screen.

These are far more the same kind of thing (eg, PMP/PDA, with Wifi):
http://www.amazon.com/ARCHOS-32-3-2-Inch-Touchscreen-Android/dp/B003X26VNM/ref=sr_1_11?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1299526746&sr=1-11
http://www.amazon.com/Archos-43-Internet-Tablet-Black/dp/B0042RRTOC/ref=sr_1_22?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1299526746&sr=1-22

The iPod Touch isn't an MP3 player, or PMP. It's a PDA, which of course includes music and video apps. Only two of the devices you called out are PMPs, none of them are PDAs, and the iPod Touch certainly has a much better screen.

These are far more the same kind of thing (eg, PMP/PDA, with Wifi):
http://www.amazon.com/ARCHOS-32-3-2-Inch-Touchscreen-Android/dp/B003X26VNM/ref=sr_1_11?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1299526746&sr=1-11
http://www.amazon.com/Archos-43-Internet-Tablet-Black/dp/B0042RRTOC/ref=sr_1_22?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1299526746&sr=1-22

I take that back. Tiger Blood existed before last week. And it's.... a frozen ice syrup????

http://www.amazon.com/Victorio-16-Ounce-Shaved-Syrup-Tigers/dp/B001PM7NG6

Really? Apple iPod touch 8 GB (4th Gen) : $204.99, Refurbished: $178.99

Sansa Fuze+ 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) : $69.00

SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 8 GB : $49.99

Sandisk Sansa Fuze 8GB : $97.68

All of the Sansa line are expandable with micro-sdhc cards, even the lowest end Sansa Clip. Micro-sdhc cards are pretty cheap these days, 8GB : ~$7.00 and 16GB: $25-$35.

As well the iPods are well known to have the worst sound of pretty much any available mp3 player. Sansa, Cowon, Samsung, and Zune are among the editor choices at anythingbutipod.com : for features, sound quality, etc. Rokbox is loadable on many of the sansa models.

I got my 8GB Fuze (refurbished) on eBay for $40, and a 16GB micro SDHC (class 4) card for $30.

The iPod line outprices nearly every other manufacturer of mp3 players, includes the cheapest headphones, has poor sound and is not expandable. The only thing it has going for it is chic-factor, name-recognition and the app store. Perhaps that has weight with some, for myself, I want my music player to have a long battery life, and play music well.

You need to compare apple to apples :D
The ipod does alot more than play music.

Really? Apple iPod touch 8 GB (4th Gen) : $204.99, Refurbished: $178.99

Sansa Fuze+ 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) : $69.00

SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 8 GB : $49.99

Sandisk Sansa Fuze 8GB : $97.68

All of the Sansa line are expandable with micro-sdhc cards, even the lowest end Sansa Clip. Micro-sdhc cards are pretty cheap these days, 8GB : ~$7.00 and 16GB: $25-$35.

As well the iPods are well known to have the worst sound of pretty much any available mp3 player. Sansa, Cowon, Samsung, and Zune are among the editor choices at anythingbutipod.com : for features, sound quality, etc. Rokbox is loadable on many of the sansa models.

I got my 8GB Fuze (refurbished) on eBay for $40, and a 16GB micro SDHC (class 4) card for $30.

The iPod line outprices nearly every other manufacturer of mp3 players, includes the cheapest headphones, has poor sound and is not expandable. The only thing it has going for it is chic-factor, name-recognition and the app store. Perhaps that has weight with some, for myself, I want my music player to have a long battery life, and play music well.

You need to compare apple to apples :D
The ipod does alot more than play music.

Really? Apple iPod touch 8 GB (4th Gen) : $204.99, Refurbished: $178.99

Sansa Fuze+ 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) : $69.00

SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 8 GB : $49.99

Sandisk Sansa Fuze 8GB : $97.68

All of the Sansa line are expandable with micro-sdhc cards, even the lowest end Sansa Clip. Micro-sdhc cards are pretty cheap these days, 8GB : ~$7.00 and 16GB: $25-$35.

As well the iPods are well known to have the worst sound of pretty much any available mp3 player. Sansa, Cowon, Samsung, and Zune are among the editor choices at anythingbutipod.com : for features, sound quality, etc. Rokbox is loadable on many of the sansa models.

I got my 8GB Fuze (refurbished) on eBay for $40, and a 16GB micro SDHC (class 4) card for $30.

The iPod line outprices nearly every other manufacturer of mp3 players, includes the cheapest headphones, has poor sound and is not expandable. The only thing it has going for it is chic-factor, name-recognition and the app store. Perhaps that has weight with some, for myself, I want my music player to have a long battery life, and play music well.

You need to compare apple to apples :D
The ipod does alot more than play music.

Really? Apple iPod touch 8 GB (4th Gen) : $204.99, Refurbished: $178.99

Sansa Fuze+ 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) : $69.00

SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 8 GB : $49.99

Sandisk Sansa Fuze 8GB : $97.68

All of the Sansa line are expandable with micro-sdhc cards, even the lowest end Sansa Clip. Micro-sdhc cards are pretty cheap these days, 8GB : ~$7.00 and 16GB: $25-$35.

As well the iPods are well known to have the worst sound of pretty much any available mp3 player. Sansa, Cowon, Samsung, and Zune are among the editor choices at anythingbutipod.com : for features, sound quality, etc. Rokbox is loadable on many of the sansa models.

I got my 8GB Fuze (refurbished) on eBay for $40, and a 16GB micro SDHC (class 4) card for $30.

The iPod line outprices nearly every other manufacturer of mp3 players, includes the cheapest headphones, has poor sound and is not expandable. The only thing it has going for it is chic-factor, name-recognition and the app store. Perhaps that has weight with some, for myself, I want my music player to have a long battery life, and play music well.

You need to compare apple to apples :D
The ipod does alot more than play music.

Really? Apple iPod touch 8 GB (4th Gen) : $204.99, Refurbished: $178.99 Sansa Fuze+ 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) : $69.00 SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 8 GB : $49.99 Sandisk Sansa Fuze 8GB : $97.68

Odd comparison there, comparing a wifi-capable, full-touch screen iPod capable of running all the iOS apps, to a few models of audio-only, non-touch screen players. Why not compare to the iPod Nano 8GB at $149? Non-expandable, but half the size of any of those, which may be more important for some consumers.

The iPod line outprices nearly every other manufacturer of mp3 players, includes the cheapest headphones, has poor sound and is not expandable. The only thing it has going for it is chic-factor, name-recognition and the app store. Perhaps that has weight with some, for myself, I want my music player to have a long battery life, and play music well.

The specific one you're citing has a multi-touch screen and the ability to run hundreds of thousands of applications, which you conveniently left of your "only thing it has going for it." Perhaps you're making a false comparison for the purpose of trying to bolster your losing argument?

Really? Apple iPod touch 8 GB (4th Gen) : $204.99, Refurbished: $178.99 Sansa Fuze+ 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) : $69.00 SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 8 GB : $49.99 Sandisk Sansa Fuze 8GB : $97.68

Odd comparison there, comparing a wifi-capable, full-touch screen iPod capable of running all the iOS apps, to a few models of audio-only, non-touch screen players. Why not compare to the iPod Nano 8GB at $149? Non-expandable, but half the size of any of those, which may be more important for some consumers.

The iPod line outprices nearly every other manufacturer of mp3 players, includes the cheapest headphones, has poor sound and is not expandable. The only thing it has going for it is chic-factor, name-recognition and the app store. Perhaps that has weight with some, for myself, I want my music player to have a long battery life, and play music well.

The specific one you're citing has a multi-touch screen and the ability to run hundreds of thousands of applications, which you conveniently left of your "only thing it has going for it." Perhaps you're making a false comparison for the purpose of trying to bolster your losing argument?

Really? Apple iPod touch 8 GB (4th Gen) : $204.99, Refurbished: $178.99 Sansa Fuze+ 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) : $69.00 SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 8 GB : $49.99 Sandisk Sansa Fuze 8GB : $97.68

Odd comparison there, comparing a wifi-capable, full-touch screen iPod capable of running all the iOS apps, to a few models of audio-only, non-touch screen players. Why not compare to the iPod Nano 8GB at $149? Non-expandable, but half the size of any of those, which may be more important for some consumers.

The iPod line outprices nearly every other manufacturer of mp3 players, includes the cheapest headphones, has poor sound and is not expandable. The only thing it has going for it is chic-factor, name-recognition and the app store. Perhaps that has weight with some, for myself, I want my music player to have a long battery life, and play music well.

The specific one you're citing has a multi-touch screen and the ability to run hundreds of thousands of applications, which you conveniently left of your "only thing it has going for it." Perhaps you're making a false comparison for the purpose of trying to bolster your losing argument?

Really? Apple iPod touch 8 GB (4th Gen) : $204.99, Refurbished: $178.99 Sansa Fuze+ 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) : $69.00 SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 8 GB : $49.99 Sandisk Sansa Fuze 8GB : $97.68

Odd comparison there, comparing a wifi-capable, full-touch screen iPod capable of running all the iOS apps, to a few models of audio-only, non-touch screen players. Why not compare to the iPod Nano 8GB at $149? Non-expandable, but half the size of any of those, which may be more important for some consumers.

The iPod line outprices nearly every other manufacturer of mp3 players, includes the cheapest headphones, has poor sound and is not expandable. The only thing it has going for it is chic-factor, name-recognition and the app store. Perhaps that has weight with some, for myself, I want my music player to have a long battery life, and play music well.

The specific one you're citing has a multi-touch screen and the ability to run hundreds of thousands of applications, which you conveniently left of your "only thing it has going for it." Perhaps you're making a false comparison for the purpose of trying to bolster your losing argument?

no, but Jerry's daughter did. It's an ebook for kindle

http://www.amazon.com/Outies-Mote-Gods-Eye-ebook/dp/B004FGMURG/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1299440097&sr=8-1

I totally agree with that. The war should not be "on drugs", but on the reasons why people chose taking them.

Or maybe it shouldn't be called a war at all? I don't think it's unreasonable to say we should reserve war for our mortal enemies.

This tendency of declaring war on arbitrary things goes back to progressives, such as Woodrow Wilson, who saw the military as a means of organizing and unifying society. That's why, for example, he declared a "war on poverty." You still see it with modern liberals, like Rahm Emanuel, who proposed "basic training, civil defense preparation, and community service" for everyone aged 18-25 in his book (not sure how to direct link, just search it for "universal citizen service", the chapter starts at page 58).

It was a terrible idea then, and it's a terrible idea now: we don't need to unify society around grand visions by aping the military. It is just a way of stomping all over the basic freedom of millions of people to do what the hell they want with their life, not what some politician thinks would make him look good in a history book.

Really? Apple iPod touch 8 GB (4th Gen) : $204.99, Refurbished: $178.99
Sansa Fuze+ 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) : $69.00
SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 8 GB : $49.99
Sandisk Sansa Fuze 8GB : $97.68

All of the Sansa line are expandable with micro-sdhc cards, even the lowest end Sansa Clip. Micro-sdhc cards are pretty cheap these days, 8GB : ~$7.00 and 16GB: $25-$35.

As well the iPods are well known to have the worst sound of pretty much any available mp3 player. Sansa, Cowon, Samsung, and Zune are among the editor choices at anythingbutipod.com : for features, sound quality, etc. Rokbox is loadable on many of the sansa models.
I got my 8GB Fuze (refurbished) on eBay for $40, and a 16GB micro SDHC (class 4) card for $30.

The iPod line outprices nearly every other manufacturer of mp3 players, includes the cheapest headphones, has poor sound and is not expandable. The only thing it has going for it is chic-factor, name-recognition and the app store. Perhaps that has weight with some, for myself, I want my music player to have a long battery life, and play music well.

Really? Apple iPod touch 8 GB (4th Gen) : $204.99, Refurbished: $178.99
Sansa Fuze+ 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) : $69.00
SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 8 GB : $49.99
Sandisk Sansa Fuze 8GB : $97.68

All of the Sansa line are expandable with micro-sdhc cards, even the lowest end Sansa Clip. Micro-sdhc cards are pretty cheap these days, 8GB : ~$7.00 and 16GB: $25-$35.

As well the iPods are well known to have the worst sound of pretty much any available mp3 player. Sansa, Cowon, Samsung, and Zune are among the editor choices at anythingbutipod.com : for features, sound quality, etc. Rokbox is loadable on many of the sansa models.
I got my 8GB Fuze (refurbished) on eBay for $40, and a 16GB micro SDHC (class 4) card for $30.

The iPod line outprices nearly every other manufacturer of mp3 players, includes the cheapest headphones, has poor sound and is not expandable. The only thing it has going for it is chic-factor, name-recognition and the app store. Perhaps that has weight with some, for myself, I want my music player to have a long battery life, and play music well.

Really? Apple iPod touch 8 GB (4th Gen) : $204.99, Refurbished: $178.99
Sansa Fuze+ 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) : $69.00
SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 8 GB : $49.99
Sandisk Sansa Fuze 8GB : $97.68

All of the Sansa line are expandable with micro-sdhc cards, even the lowest end Sansa Clip. Micro-sdhc cards are pretty cheap these days, 8GB : ~$7.00 and 16GB: $25-$35.

As well the iPods are well known to have the worst sound of pretty much any available mp3 player. Sansa, Cowon, Samsung, and Zune are among the editor choices at anythingbutipod.com : for features, sound quality, etc. Rokbox is loadable on many of the sansa models.
I got my 8GB Fuze (refurbished) on eBay for $40, and a 16GB micro SDHC (class 4) card for $30.

The iPod line outprices nearly every other manufacturer of mp3 players, includes the cheapest headphones, has poor sound and is not expandable. The only thing it has going for it is chic-factor, name-recognition and the app store. Perhaps that has weight with some, for myself, I want my music player to have a long battery life, and play music well.

Really? Apple iPod touch 8 GB (4th Gen) : $204.99, Refurbished: $178.99
Sansa Fuze+ 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) : $69.00
SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 8 GB : $49.99
Sandisk Sansa Fuze 8GB : $97.68

All of the Sansa line are expandable with micro-sdhc cards, even the lowest end Sansa Clip. Micro-sdhc cards are pretty cheap these days, 8GB : ~$7.00 and 16GB: $25-$35.

As well the iPods are well known to have the worst sound of pretty much any available mp3 player. Sansa, Cowon, Samsung, and Zune are among the editor choices at anythingbutipod.com : for features, sound quality, etc. Rokbox is loadable on many of the sansa models.
I got my 8GB Fuze (refurbished) on eBay for $40, and a 16GB micro SDHC (class 4) card for $30.

The iPod line outprices nearly every other manufacturer of mp3 players, includes the cheapest headphones, has poor sound and is not expandable. The only thing it has going for it is chic-factor, name-recognition and the app store. Perhaps that has weight with some, for myself, I want my music player to have a long battery life, and play music well.

http://www.amazon.com/FarmVille-Dummies-Angela-Morales/dp/1118016963

That's right, Farmville For Dummies.

You may now cry yourself to sleep.

--
BMO

There is a pretty good documentary that NOVA did about this team (and others competing) called the Great Robot Race
Forgive if I mess this up but link here or here if you prefer Amazon.

The vehicle completing the DARPA challenge nicknamed Stanley, is currently in the Smithsonian National Museum of American History.